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Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump have both won the most states in the biggest day of the race for the US presidential nomination.
Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton on Wednesday surged ahead in the 2016 US presidential polls by posting emphatic wins in the crucial 'Super Tuesday' primaries as an epic face-off between the two front-runners seemed likely after the biggest day of the race for nominations.
Coming within striking distance of becoming the Republican nominee, Trump, who has faced intense attack from other contenders for his radical views, notched up victories in seven states -- Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Vermont and Virginia.
Clinton, who is the Democratic Party front-runner and is aspiring to be America's first woman president, also clinched seven states in the 'Super Tuesday' primaries -- Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Massachusetts,
Tennessee, Texas and Virginia. She won big among African-American voters and reversed a 2008 primary loss in Virginia to President Barack Obama.
However, both Clinton and Trump were denied a clean sweep which many poll pundits had predicted on Super Tuesday, the 2016 campaign's biggest day of nominating contests.
On the Republican side, Ted Cruz claimed the day's biggest prize -- Texas -- along with Oklahoma and Alaska while Marco Rubio landed his first win of the 2016 campaign in Minnesota.
On the Democrat side, Clinton's main rival Bernie Sanders registered victories in four states. Sanders captured Colorado, Oklahoma, Minnesota and his home state of Vermont.
Trump, 69, emerged from the contests closer than ever to the nomination and was acting more and more like a general election candidate eager to take on Clinton.
"This has been an amazing night," Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida. He vowed to be a "unifier" and to go after Clinton with a singular focus once the Republican race eventually winds up.
"Once we get all of this finished, I'm going to go after one person, and that's Hillary Clinton," he said, adding, "I think that's frankly going to be an easy race."
"What a Super Tuesday," Clinton, the former secretary of state, declared at her victory rally in Florida, taking aim at Trump by asserting that America was already great, despite his campaign mantra, and vowing to make the country "whole again."
"America never stopped being great. We have to make America whole," Clinton, who has built up a delegate cushion over her insurgent rival Bernie Sanders, said.
Trump, on the other hand, asserted that he is "unifier" in the party and is bringing a cross-section of the society to the Republican Party.
"I am a unifier. I would love to see the Republican party and everybody get together and unify. And there is no one who is going to beat us," Trump said.
"I think we're going to be more inclusive...more unified, and I think we're going to be a much bigger party..," he said.
"We have to rebuild our country. Our country is going to hell...and Hillary Clinton doesn't have a clue," Trump said.
Referring to Clinton's email scandal, he said: "I don't know if she'll be allowed to run. What she did was criminal. If she is allowed to run it will be a sad day for this country because what she did is wrong."
"And other people have done far less than her and they paid a very, very high price," he added.
The Democratic race is guaranteed to go on for months, however, because the party's system of proportionally awarding delegates means no candidate is yet close to reaching the magic number of 2,383 delegates to win the nomination.
Clinton is projected so far to win 492 delegates on Super Tuesday, compared to 330 for Sanders. That gives Clinton a grand total of 1,055 delegates -- including super delegates, who are leading party officials and lawmakers who have endorsed her campaign. Sanders has 418 delegates so far in the race, CNN reported.
Clinton, who also won the Democratic caucuses in the territory of American Samoa, said, "We have to make strong the broken places, re-stitch the bonds of trust and respect across our country."
"Now it might be unusual, as I've said before, for a presidential candidate to say this, but I'm going to keep saying it, 'I believe what we need in America today is more love and kindness," she said.
"Because you know what? It works. Instead of building walls we're going to break down barriers and build ladders of opportunity and empowerment so every American can live up to his or her potential, because then and only then can America live up to its full potential too," she said in an apparent swipe at Trump who has vowed to build a wall at the Mexico border.
Sanders, in his victory speech, said, "We started off the night winning Vermont, then we won Oklahoma and Colorado, and moments ago they called Minnesota for us as well. Four big victories for our political revolution tonight."
Trump had already won three primaries and came second in Iowa behind Cruz.
Ahead of 'Super Tuesday', Clinton had also secured three wins in the first four early-voting states and has led significantly among blocs of black voters there.
Trump has stunned the Republican establishment to become the party's front-runner. Despite his controversial policies on immigration, the former reality TV star has been consistently polling well above his rivals -- Cruz, Rubio, Kasich and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson.